Time was when Disney Animation and their smarter brother Pixar were one of the few guarantees of the holiday season.
But the last decent Disney movies were back in 2016 – Zootopia and Moana – while Pixar seems to have become bogged down by rather ordinary sequels. The missing ingredient, I suspect, may be the supremely gifted heir to Uncle Walt Disney himself, former CEO John Lasseter.
But, like Disney himself, Lasseter had a few personal issues, and got Me-Too-ed out of a job around 2017. About the time that Disney’s quality control took a dive. Particularly their story sense.
Photo: Disney
Which brings me to the recent spectacular flop, we’re told, Strange World.
The publicity for Strange World was underwhelming. What on earth is it about? We’re told that in a mythical, mountain-ringed country called Avalonia, heroic explorer Jaeger Clade dreamed of discovering the way out.
His son Searcher prefers farming, and the father and son part when Searcher discovers a magic plant that solves all of Avalonia’s power problems. Twenty-five years then pass…. Wait, what?
You don’t need to be John Lasseter to spot a few structural issues already in Strange World, and we’re barely 10 minutes into the story.
Anyhoo, Searcher gets married to Meridian and they have a kid called Ethan, and suddenly a rocket ship lands at their farm with President Callisto on board. Avalonia is in grave danger, Callisto explains.
They all take off with Searcher, despite his lack of interest or qualifications, on a mission to save Avalonia. They find themselves in a psychedelic underworld – all pinks and purples and weird faceless creatures attacking them.
It’s like Fantasia without Mickey Mouse, or the Pixar classic Inside out without Pixar’s solid story sense.
Strange World’s lack of old-fashioned Disney magic – I can tell you right now there are no Princesses in this story or any decent jokes – isn’t the reason that so many right-wing American commentators are apoplectic with fury over it.
They’re up in arms because of its high representation of people who didn’t usually feature in old-school Disney films. That’s a good thing isn’t it?
Avalonia may be a tiny, mythical town in the mountains, but it’s cast from all over the Earth. All ages, genders and cultures are on display. It’s like the command deck of the starship Enterprise. Even the dog has three legs.
And for added wokeness, Searcher’s son Ethan is glad to be gay – he’s got a crush on his best friend at school.
All of which could have been a brave new direction for the Mouse Factory, driven by the perceived demands of a 2022 audience. If it hadn’t been predicated on the notion of it being good for us.
What story there is starts out as several generations of daddy issues, with Mom eye-rolling in the background. Come on guys, what about a group hug?
Then suddenly it switches to an ecological allegory. If you’ve been in an audience of 10-year olds, all crying out for an ecological allegory, you move in different circles from me.
Now I realise that the old Disney formula may not be to all modern tastes – the princess, the likable kid, the evil villain, the amusing animated sidekicks, the happy ending.
But if you’re going to replace it – and by all means go ahead and replace it - it’s going to have to be at least as good as that.
In fact, messing with the formula was why the Lasseter era at, first Pixar and then Disney was so rewarding.
The last place I want to find myself is next to the so-called “anti-woke brigade”, but box-ticking films like Strange World are, frankly, doing nobody any favours.
